Curry's Podshow tweaks the Expo

FrankBarnako

The elephant in the room that nobody talked about at last weekend's Podcast Expo was the biggest commercial podcast venture in the world, Podshow Inc.

Instead of participating in the show and being invited to keynote, the "Podfather," Adam Curry, no-showed and pleaded other business in London to the press.

But other Podshow people were in Ontario, Calif., orchestrating the company's UnExpo2 promotion. Podshow picked up podcasters at the Ontario Convention Center in a Hummer limousine to take them to the Sheraton, a block away. At the hotel, they munched and schmoozed, and also were invited to "meet with your PodShow PIMP" and audition to be part of the company's lineup of podcasts.

Podshow's director of marketing communications, Aaron Burcell, accused the Expo's organizers of pressuring the "official hotel, the Marriott, to prevent Podshow from having its UnExpo reception there. Burcell, in an e-mail, said that he was forced to move everything a block away to the Sheraton.

"True," said Podcast Expo's organizer, Tim Bourquin of TNC NewMedia. "It's not fair for a company to leech off the show and all these attendees, sponsors and exhibitors." More on the blog.

Tim Street's gadget girls

The French Maids have only just begun to sell out.

Last week, Tim Street's comely lasses released a four-minute show in which they get their own Web domain at GoDaddy.com. "We created the episode in which, step by step, they register Frenchmaidtvdreams.com," Street said. "It's way more fun to watch the maids do it." And, if he has his way, it's not the last thing they'll do.

There have been four French Maids episodes. After the first one last December, Street said "I knew we were onto something, but I had to find a sponsor. Rather than making more shows, I spent time looking for backing." Eventually, Street met Mark McCrery of Podtrac.com, who put the advertiser and the program producer together.

"This is integrated marketing," Street said in an interview at last weekend's Podcast Expo. "This is a way to reach 18- to 24-year-old males and show them how to use new tech products." Discussions have been held with Nokia Corp.
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he added, about having the maids demonstrate new phones.

Rocketboom's ad price: $80K a week

Andrew Baron seems to have shaken off the heartbreak of separation and gotten down to business. While Amanda Congdon, with whom he co-founded Rocketboom, is on a coast-to-coast trip in a Ford Hybrid, Baron is newly focused.

Addressing the Saturday session of the Podcast Expo, Baron said that he's just done a deal worth $80,000 for a week of commercials in his video blog. Claiming a daily audience of some 300,000 people, Baron could be getting more than a $55 CPM for his ads.

You could get a discount, though. He'll sell you a week of spots for $60,000 -- if he likes the commercial content. "Ads should be consistent with the interest of our audience," Baron told the morning keynote audience.

Rocketboom knows its audience, understands what they're interested in and tailors its content. An example would be "lifestyle" gadgets, like the new Nokia phone that can download podcasts. The same should apply to advertising. That means no ads, for instance, for home-cleaning products. "I'm only going to work with advertisers I want to work with," Baron said, "and I'm only going to run ads I like."

Rocketboom has other ways to generate revenue, and Baron added that he's going to exploit them anew. One is merchandising. "We really suck at it," pointing out that Rocketboom has almost hidden the link for fans to purchase a T-shirt. "Yet we bring in $4,000 a month on that one item," he said in something like amazement. "There's a lot of potential. We need lots of shirts, and we ought to put them on the front page."

Baron also raised the possibility of a paid-version of Rocketboom; Congdon hinted at it last May. Subscribers paying $3.50 a month might have access to outtakes of Rocketboom episodes, lengthier segments and additional shows. "Imagine if I could get 10,000 people, a tiny fraction of our audience. That would mean $35,000 a month. I could have a family and we could all be happy at Rocketboom."

Such a small audience can generate big dollars for Rocketboom. Baron said that big media like the Walt Disney Co.
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will recognize the possibilities. "Soon, Disney is going to feel confident with an audience of 10,000 hard-core, dedicated fans focused on specific content." And advertisers, he predicted, "will drool over such an audience because it will be so targeted."

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